Maile Levy Ms. Leonard English 9H Per. 3 3/7/16 Friendship Keeps Humans Content Everyone needs companionship to truly prosper in life and be cheerful. In the novel, Of Mice and Men, by John Steinbeck this claim appears many times through characters who struggle with feeling fulfilled due to the lack of companionship. The characters are jealous of the relationship George and Lennie have because of their solitude. This envy is proven multiple times within the book with Crooks, Candy, and even Slim, showing that it is human nature to crave attention because of the fear of being alone. Because of Crook’s ethnicity, he is discriminated making him an outcast. In the barn, crooks finally spills out his feeling to Lennie, considering the fact that he has never talked about his feeling before, but he then reveals, “ A guy goes nuts if he ain 't got nobody. Don 't make no difference who the guy is long’s he’s with you,” (80). Crooks had to abolish his hopes to persevere his dreams because of his skin color. He was so desperate for companionship that he poured out all of his feelings on Lennie who could not comprehend his thoughts. It shows a sense of hopelessness that he can only share it with the most hopeless person of them all, Lennie. Later in the same conversation, the brutality of segregation is shown once again when he says, “S’pose you didn’t have nobody. S’pose you couldn’t go to the bunk house and play rummy ‘cause you was black,” (80). Crooks experiences a
Decisions shouldn’t be made based on fear and the possibility of what might happen, but sometimes it’s that fear of the possibility that forces the unwanted decisions to be made. In Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck, a man with a mental disability accidently kills Curley’s wife; that man is known as Lennie. Curley immediately sends his men after Lennie when he found what Lennie had done to his wife. Lennie escapes into the bushes and waits for his best friend, George. When George found out what had happened, he sneaks off to help prevent Lennie from possible punishments; he shoots Linnie behind the head. What George did was best for Lennie.
Loneliness is one of the primary themes in Of Mice and Men. Throughout the novel, John Steinbeck shows the enormous effect that loneliness has on the characters. Steinbeck most clearly illustrates this theme through Crooks, Candy, and Curley 's wife. Ranch hands are ideal types of people to portray as being lonely, because their constant travel leaves them without someone to talk to or share things with. Steinbeck also shows how important it is for every human being to have a companion. Companionship is necessary in order for someone to live an enjoyable life. Although loneliness affects each one of the characters in Of Mice and Men differently, they all experience negative feelings from their lack of
Do opposites really attract? Can two people, with no similarities, share a close bond? It proves to be so in the novel Of Mice and Men , written by John Steinbeck. A novel which tells the story of two men, George and Lennie, and their journey of a new job working on a ranch. A novel with a different but interesting style of writing. A novel where John Steinbeck utilizes how powerful George is over Lennie, to signify how people believe they are dominant over others, because of their greater intelligence, social standards, or wealth.
Besides the American Dream, the theme of death plays a major role and is recurring in both texts. From the novel ‘Of mice and men’, both Lennie and Curley’s Wife die. From this we can deduce that they both got killed due to their differences and society looking at them in a different way. Both texts also foreshadow the future deaths from the beginning to the end of the texts, there is hints everywhere. The moment that Curley’s Wife was introduced, an ill feeling overcame the atmosphere indicating that Lennie will be getting into a mess with her. At the beginning, George clearly states that Lennie always gets George into trouble. Steinbeck states ‘You do bad things and I got to get you out’. Previously, before George and Lennie arrived at the ranch, Lennie got into trouble by supposedly attacking the only woman in Weed. This also suggests that there will be trouble between Curley’s Wife, who is the only woman on the ranch and Lennie. Connecting ends with ends, this shows that the only two women are insecure. Later on, there was an intimation that she is going to be killed by Lennie as Lennie kills the soft things he likes to ‘pet’ such as the puppy and the mouse. In the novel Curley’s Wife lets him touch her dress, which is soft therefore leading to an inevitable death.
Some characters in this novel are alienated by mainstream society because they do not fit society’s ideal image of a person. And they are all not accepted as human beings. Throughout John Steinbeck’s novel, Of Mice and Men, the social injustice of how people were treated during the Great Depression is explored through the characters Crooks, Curley’s wife, and Lennie, to show that society actually needs to become stronger than it really is.
The unemployment rate for African Americans during the Great Depression reached upward of 50 percent at its peak. The commonly seen statistic of a 25 percent unemployment rate is primarily only applicable to white males at the time. The Great Depression stressed many societal structures that oppressed peoples based on race, gender ability to work, and socioeconomic standing. Despite the fact that over three quarters of a century has passed since the end of the Great Depression, many of these inequalities still remain (although to a lesser extent). A large number of Discussion about the social problems in the 1930s may still be applicable to today 's society. In his novel Of Mice and Men, Steinbeck outlines many corrupt societal structures intended to exploit and demean individuals based on their perceived value: the inherent exploitative nature of the American Dream, the hierarchy of power in America based on an individual 's ability to work, and the way in which oppressive systems are maintained through a mis-projection of anger of the oppressed.
“I want you to stay with me Lennie. Jesus Christ, somebody’d shoot you for a coyote if you was by yourself.” The novel Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck shows the relationship between two migrant workers in the 1930s, George and Lennie, along with the other members on the new ranch that they began working on. Georgie and Lennie dreamed of following the American Dream and owning their own patch of land and the novel revolves around the dream and the obstacles that stand in their way. Lennie, a strong but mentally ill person, who accompanies George, eventually makes George think about how much easier the dream could be achieved without Lennie, eventually leading to the downfall of their friendship. The novel shows what it means to be human
Of Mice and Men takes place in the country fields of Salinas and Soledad California with ranchos and ranchero people that come to the country to look for work to support themselves. Back in the 1940’s, lonely people would go from place to place to look for work on the farms. People would go find work and some of them do with luck and from the help of others. In the case of George and Lennie, they were running away from Weed where they used to work. George and Lennie had to run away because Lennie was getting in trouble for something that was misinterpreted as a violation to a girl that lived in Weed. Lennie did not do anything to the girl, she just got scared of Lennie when he was trying to touch her red pretty dress and all of sudden they both got into an argument from touching the dress to it being seen as rape. Lennie has a mental problem that makes him act like a kid and all he can think about is petting mice and rabbits. He cannot live a normal life like every adult can.
In a discussion John Steinbeck said, "I worked in the same country that the story is laid in. The characters are composites to a certain extent. Lennie was a real person. He's in an insane asylum in California right now. I worked alongside him for many weeks . . .” (Parini 27)
John Steinbeck 's novella, “Of Mice and Men”, set in California in the early to mid-1930s during the Great Depression is a microcosm. The novella tells the story of two itinerant workers, George Milton and Lennie Small, who are in search of a new job and looking for new opportunities as they move from ranch to ranch. It focuses on the barbaric relationships the men on the ranch including George and Lennie start to develop with each other as the novella progresses. The novella shows the importance of violence by focusing on how it is a part of human nature and especially making the needless and gratuitous violence in the world of men evident to the reader, thus implying the brutal and violent society that the ranch workers during the Great Depression inhabit.
“Of Mice and Men” is a short story written by John Steinbeck. In “Of Mice of Men”, George and Lennie, the main characters, are forced to run away from Weed after Lennie gets in a mix up with a girl and is accused of rape. They end up getting a new job in Soledad to work on a ranch. While there as ranch hands and migrant workers, George and Lennie form good relationships with some, but bad relationships with others. Lennie has tons of physical strength stored deep inside of him that he doesn’t fully understand that he has. With this strength, he unintentionally kills a mouse, breaks Curley’s hand, kills his new puppy, and kills Curley’s wife. Without the option to migrate to another ranch for work, George is forced to kill Lennie for the other men were out to get him. Ever since the beginning of George and Lennie’s adventure they had their dream in mind as a “light of the end the tunnel.” George comforts Lennie with this dream of theirs as he puts the barrel of the gun to the back of his head and pulls the trigger. Dreams play a very important role in this novel. In “Of Mice and Men”, Steinbeck uses failed and elusive dreams to show how captivating life can be when chasing the American Dream.
Chapter 3: “George half-closed his eyes.”I gotta think about that. We was always gonna do it by ourselves." Candy interrupted him, "I 'd make a will an ' leave my share to you guys in case I kick off, 'cause I ain 't got no relatives or nothing"”
During the Great Depression, it was not uncommon to become morosely secluded while working. Men would go far away from their families in search of any jobs they could get, with only themselves to confide in; colleagues only filling in the void of friends and family partially. Naturally, John Steinbeck’s novel Of Mice and Men, written during this period, would reflect this fact as a major aspect of the story. Loneliness would become the sinew of Of Mice and Men, manifested in some of the story’s main characters: Candy, Crooks, and Curley’s wife. These allusions to loneliness are found throughout the book, mimicking the rampant disease of isolation at the time.
“Of Mice and Men” is a novella written by John Steinbeck in the 1930’s and he used the line from an 18th Century poem by Robert Burns as the title of the story. “Of Mice and Men” (“OMaM”) as a title foreshadows the idea portrayed by Burns in his poem “To a mouse” because in this poem the mouse’s house was destroyed in an accidental mistake which implies dreams being shattered and depression along with death following as a result.
The novella “Of Mice and Men” by John Steinbeck (published in 1937) and the play “Death of a Salesman” by Arthur Miller (published in 1949) both focus on the idea of the American dream creating a better life for oneself in a land of opportunity. However, both texts question whether this dream is achievable or just an illusion which is unattainable.